Benefits of Liberal Arts Degrees
College Programs That Help Students Meet Needs of Global Marketplace
Dec 11, 2008
When choosing between Liberal Arts degrees or Vocational degrees, students may want to ask themselves which kind of education will serve the global marketplace. The answer to this question seems to be Liberal Arts programs.
Liberal Arts Degrees Offer Real World Skills
Tony Wagner wrote an article in the October 2008 issue of Educational Leadership that detailed the seven things economic and educational leaders consider essential in a powerful workforce that is ready to compete in the global marketplace. They are:
- Critical thinking and problem solving
- Collaboration and leadership
- Agility and adaptability
- Initiative and entrepreneurialism
- Accessing and analyzing information
- Curiosity and imagination
- Effective oral and written communication
Business leaders often say skills trump content. Most companies teach their employees what they need to know about the business. What companies are looking for in a prospective employee are the kinds of skills taught in Liberal Arts Programs.
Liberal Arts Programs Are Not a Passing Trend
When Thomas Jefferson touted the benefits of liberal arts programs, he may or may not have had the twenty-first century in mind. However, the fundamentals of liberal arts degrees are well-suited to today’s needs.
- Liberal arts programs teach students how to think, not what to think. It trains people to think analytically and independently, with empathy and self-control.
- Liberal arts programs teach students how to learn. Albert Einstein said, “A person doesn’t need to go to college to learn facts. He can get them from books. The value of liberal arts degrees is that they train the mind to think.” (Frank, Phillip. 1947. Einstein: His Life and Times. 185. Alfred A. Knopf.)
- Instead of cramming as many facts into four years as possible, liberal arts degrees help students develop the tools to keep learning new things throughout a lifetime.
- Liberal arts degrees prepare students better for all of life – not just a job.
- Liberal arts programs make people more interesting. The wider knowledge base a person has, the more she will be able to exercise her creativity and wit and apply it in wisdom. By the way, employers want creativity, wit, and wisdom – along with a broad base of transferable skills and communication skills.
Robert A. Heinlein, author of Stranger in a Strange Land, said that humans should have the capability to "change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer..." and the list goes on. OK, so a student won’t learn all of this in liberal arts programs. The point is, a liberal arts degrees equip students by making them aware of such literature and enabling them to use it in conversation!
